


Lupus Dei

by rroseselavy



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: M/M, Werewolf AU, magic!Arthur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 04:04:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8431192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rroseselavy/pseuds/rroseselavy
Summary: We are the Hounds of God, us you call werewolves. We work to protect humanity from the Devil. We fight the servants of Hell: the devil and his witches. We take the crops he takes to feed his demons back, keep him from spoiling our lands and our children. There is a place in the world for us. There is a place in Heaven for us.Happy Halloween!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kevystel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kevystel/gifts).



There was a new man in town. He showed up in a car that was just old enough to be called not new and just new and ugly enough to not be called vintage. This not new, not old enough car had all of his belongings stashed in the trunk and the back seat. This new man had his clothes, a record player, and a few milk crates full of records stacked on the passenger’s side of his vehicle. A cat in its carrier pawed and mewed in the back, delicately perched to keep it from being flattened by any moving luggage. There were a few large boxes hitting him on the back of his head as he pulled into the parking lot of his new lodging complex. He quietly cursed each time it bumped into him, but did nothing to fix it. He started to unpack, lifting box after box from his car and holding the door to his flat open with a free pair of snow boots.

There was a new man in town, and most of his flat’s furniture was made out of repurposed wood pallets. Good thing it had been left by the previous tenant and he hadn’t paid a cent for it.

He unpacked the last boxes from his car when he knew everyone else in the building was either in their flats or asleep. A big box just labeled “Spices???” by whoever had been packing up his more…regular affairs.

They weren’t spices, but thanks for offending him.

Another large box, which the new man gingerly placed on his makeshift wooden pallet coffee table. Out came a few more bundles of herbs; these were the ones that he was not able to have fit in the other “Spices” box.

A couple slabs of salt. Literally several tablets made of rock salt. Feathers, enough to make a whole bird, and crystals. Vials upon vials of various sizes and a few empty Hennessey bottles filled with things that were definitely not Hennessey.

Candles. _So many candles._

A cauldron, which contained a grimoire scratched raw and oozing with notes in black ink.

There was new man in town, and we might want to add that he was a sorcerer.

He was here on business. Someone who would remain nameless had told him that there was word of pack of werewolves somewhere in the area that should probably be at the _very_ least registered and reported. Hopefully not hunted, but he never knew.

He could feel them sitting on the nape of his neck, though. They were definitely close; he would know that spearmint tang of werewolf trail from anywhere. He had no idea if they could sense him. He figured if they had, they would have already been at his door. The moon wasn’t even full; it was the new moon, meaning their physical strength was probably at its most human.

He had things to unpack, a life to live, and a new town to get the hang of before he was ever going to really get a hold of any werewolves. He would have to keep a low profile.

~~

He was trying to ignore the oddly colored pair of eyes following him down the historical nonfiction aisle of the library. He had stayed awake all night in a vain attempt at getting his life organized and was trying to find the most antisocial way to be social. Nothing said getting “out there” quite like grabbing some goliath of a book and thumping it open while crouched over it in public. He was doing exactly that when the washed-out figure in the corner stalked forward and dropped himself into the chair across from him.

“Did it come with a broom?”

“Pardon?” The new man did not look up.

“Your overcoat thing. Did it come with a broom?”

The new man briefly looked down at his…oh, _shit._ Way to keep a low profile. It was what had been at the top of his box of clothes: a long, flowing black overcoat with sleeves that most people could stuff their heads into. If that was something they were interested in.

“It didn’t.”

The intruder tugs at the wide sleeves of his coat, rubbing it between his fingers. The owner of the coat doesn’t know whether to feel discomfort at this newcomer’s sudden invasion of his space or just irritation.

“Is it a kimono?”

“Is it _any_ of your business?”

“I apologize. I really should introduce myself. I’m Gilbert Bielschmidt, and I’m probably dressed more sensibly than you.”

Silence.

“Your turn.”

The new man finally turns his eyes up to look at whoever is bothering him. The man calling himself Gilbert looks like something neatly carved from granite; he was paler than the pages he was just poring over, and looked just as capable of giving you a nasty cut.

“I’m Arthur.”

“Like the king?”

“Yes. Are you Gilbert like the liver issue?”

Gilbert lets out a laugh that’s more of a wheeze.

“Nope.”

There is a defiant softness to Arthur’s features; his too-dark brow is set low and his chin is stubborn in a way that offsets the fullness of his cheeks. Gilbert cannot tell if the person he has decided to speak to is fourteen or forty-five. He imagines Arthur prefers it that way.

“You’re new here.”

“You’re very observant,” Arthur replies before turning the page of his book. “Do you have other things to do other than observe things?”

“No, I read my quota of four books and then I terrorize the other people here until someone kicks me out.”

Silence.

“I don’t actually do that.”

“I assumed.” Arthur gets up and is suddenly hit with the unmistakable smell of spearmint. _Be calm._ He fingers the silver amulet in his pocket.

“Something wrong?”

“I’m fine.” He looked back over at his new acquaintance, who had a look of concern that _utterly_ contradicted his bleak facial structure.

“Don’t you have a _job_ or something else you could be doing?”

Gilbert lets out a low whistle.

“Do you?” he responds.

Arthur, not having any sort of proper response to that, moves away to check out the book he was reading. The smell of spearmint was assaulting his nostrils. The woman who is stamping his book cranes her neck to take a look at the area that Arthur just exited.

“You have a mild nuisance in the nonfiction aisle,” he said nonchalantly.

“Gil? He doesn’t really mean any harm.”

“Mm.”

“Where are you from?”

His eyebrow quirked.

“Your accent. What part of England are you from?”

“Cardiff,” he replied, picking a thread off of his decidedly _witchy_ overcoat.

The silver-haired gentleman was still preening in the nonfiction aisle, picking up some book on the military and opening it before slumping (he used that word loosely; almost all of the man’s movements seemed to be measured with a protractor) into a chair. _Book #5,_ Arthur briefly thought before making his way out the door.

~~

He imagined his mother, who was a librarian for fifty years, was turning in her grave. Why, you ask? Because he was using that beautifully bound book he’d gotten from the library as a temporary mouse pad.

The spearmint smell had chased him out quickly enough that he hadn’t been able to lurk; if he’d not been chased out, he’d have been able to get some proper lore and not have to result to… _Wikipedia._

He felt like a damn fool Googling “how to subdue a werewolf”, but he’d already graduated college, so there was always something he could have done that was more foolish than getting a degree in the Occult. Now _there_ was a conversation he never wanted to have with his family again.

_You want to be a magician?_

_No, mum—_

_His brother had interrupted: What kind of job are you going to get with_ that? _Do something sensible, like business or economics!_ He puffed out his cheeks in spite of himself. _Perhaps I’ll be a high-ranking, certified sorcerer,_ dickhead!

He clicked the first link that came up, reaching for a chipped mug at the side of his desk half-full of milky black tea. What could the Internet tell him that a semester of _Supernatural Creatures 101_ couldn’t? Admittedly, he had slept in the back half of the time, but he had done all the readings and had gotten an A, so did he really sleep at all?

He has an uncanny way of finding the “legitimate” websites as opposed to the non-Occult nonsense forums that tend to deal with uninformed people spreading stupid nonsense about supernatural creatures that they didn’t have the faintest clue about. Made his blood boil. He was getting off track.

Was there anything in particular that he could use to ferret them out besides the presence or the moon itself?

 _Swinging gait._ This person said that they walked in a very distinct way. Great, but unless there was someone who wanted to demonstrate, Arthur was going to keep looking.

 _Anyone born on Christmas Eve._ His brother was born on Christmas Eve and as far as he knew…

He leaned back in his chair and scratched his chin. Was Caoimhean a werewolf? He was a good eighty percent sure that Caoimhean wasn’t a werewolf. He was a good one hundred percent sure that Caoimhean was an asshole, however.

 _Anyone excommunicated by the Catholic Church will automatically become a werewolf._ That sounded like a heaping pile of bullshit if he’d ever heard anything. He kept scrolling.

 _Unibrow._ Okay, fuck you, LoneStarChaser909.

 _Rage issues._ This he had already known: werewolves got more aggressive and were more prone to outbursts the closer the full moon came. Werewolves were the most agreeable, the most docile, during the new moon.

 _…thirst._ A werewolf would be drinking water after water bottle with no end in sight to match the amount of water used to shapeshift. That was good to know. That he believed.

The name _Thiess of Kaltenbrun_ glowed on the screen and he clicked it more out of muscle memory than real interest.

  1. _Jürgensburg:_



_We are the Hounds of God._

Now he was paying attention.

_We are the Hounds of God, us you call werewolves. We work to protect humanity from the Devil. We fight the servants of Hell: the devil and his witches. We take the crops he takes to feed his demons back, keep him from spoiling our lands and our children. There is a place in the world for us. There is a place in Heaven for us._

Judging by the time stamp and location, he assumed this was a translation. The phrase “lupus dei” began to loop through his mind. Where had he heard that before?

_Lupus dei, lupus dei…_

“Meow.”

“Not now, Iggy.”

“Meow.”

 _Thump._ A ball of fur and claws nestled herself into his lap.

“Fine.” His fingers found themselves carding through that soft fur and flicking her folded ears.

“ _Brrt.”_


	2. Chapter 2

Iggy got the amazing idea to eat three entire candles while Arthur was asleep, so Arthur was now at the vet instead of being at the bank and was tapping his feet in front of him while his cat continued to nibble the wax off of her claws.

“Kirkland?” called a familiar voice. Arthur squinted at the familiar, granite-carved, _grinning_ face. Gilbert jerked his head back, motioning for Arthur to follow him into the exam room.

“Is this a joke?”

“No. What’s wrong with your cat?”

“Iggy ate three candles,” he said as Gilbert opened the carrier door. “Careful, she doesn’t tend to—“

She cuddled up into the German man’s hand and purred before he pulled her out, palpating her stomach with pursed lips. Her paws kneaded the air softly while he worked. His hands were scarred and looked out of place against the soft fur; they didn’t look like they were made for doing something that gentle.

“What kind of candles did she eat?”

“I mean…wax candles? Regular wax candles.”

“Scented or unscented?”

“Unscented.”

“She’s fine. She’s going to poop rainbows, though. So…Iggy, huh?”

“Yes, her name is Iggy.”

“As in Azalea?”

“As in _Pop_ —“

There was that toothy grin again.

“Just thought I’d check. Is there another one named Ziggy?”

“When I have enough money.”

“You know, it’s not much more expensive to have two cats as opposed to one.” He tsked, giving Iggy’s ears a scratch. “Cats do better in pairs. Or so I’ve read, but then again that’s more kittens.”

The candid look on his face and the absurdity of their conversation made Arthur wonder if he was actually being serious or if Gilbert was fucking with him.

“Put Iggy back, I want to show you something.”

Arthur obliged warily, placing a disgruntled Scottish Fold into her carrier (and noting Gilbert _apologizing_ to her) and following behind him.

“Gil, where are you taking him?”

“You know where!” he called, nonchalantly grabbing a water bottle from the receptionist’s desk.

“Don’t touch anything,” said the voice as Gilbert opened one of the back doors to reveal a room with a heat lamp in the corner.

“A lizard?” guessed the Englishman.

“No, come here! Don’t be shy,” urged Gilbert, taking a deep gulp from his water bottle. Arthur inched closer to see the twelve eggs being incubated.

“What.”

“They’re _mine_ ,” murmured Gilbert. “I’m raising them; it’s for my thesis on imprinting.”

Arthur found his eyes drawn more to Gilbert’s face, savage in the red glow of the heat lamp and alight with a boyish sort of glee that didn’t belong on his features.

“So are you a…veterinarian?”

“In training. I’m just a technician right now; I know enough to do low-grade things like make sure your cat’s okay after eating a candle, for example.”

“ _Three_ candles.”

“Feed her more. Kibble, I mean. Not candles. Or get that second cat,” he said, with a playful nudge that Arthur had no idea how to react to. “Come back in a two days if it hasn’t passed and I’ll give her something to make her…”

“Shit?”

He nodded sagely.

“If you want my number if she does any more stupid stuff…you know, moving is really rough on cats. She might just be acting out because she doesn’t like her new environment,” he informed him as he walked to the door.

“Tough for her; I’m staying for a very long time.”

“Oh?” Gilbert’s arms braced on the doorframe briefly and he leaned forward. Arthur’s nose flooded with spearmint.

“Are you…” he began, realizing he may have found his target, “…are you…” Gilbert’s expression faltered.

“I’m chewing gum, if that’s what you smell?”

_How did you not notice that before staring him down? What is wrong with you?_

“I—“

“Don’t worry about it, it’s strong stuff.”

They both walked outside to see the secretary speaking on the phone.

“—and _goodness,_ you know, if I didn’t wax or anything I’d look like a _werewolf!_ ”

Gilbert took a long swig of water from his water bottle. She noticed the two had come back out and blushed, lowering her voice.

“Anyhow, Arthur,” said Gilbert, turning to look at him. “Do you want my number?”

“It’s not very _professional_ of you—“

Gilbert shrugged.

“I’m asking about your cat. Not about your personal life. Just trying to be friendly.”

 _Friendly._ Arthur sighed. He could use _friendly._

“Here,” he muttered, grabbing Gilbert’s hand and pressing a ballpoint pen into the back of it. He ignored how warm Gilbert’s hand was and let go quickly, finding himself swallowing. Gilbert’s eyes flickered, looking down at Arthur’s lips for a split second before returning eye contact. “I’ll keep you updated.”

“Thank you. Hope she feels better.”

He nodded curtly, turning on his heel and walking abruptly out of the clinic. He closed his car door and realized his face was burning red.

~~

Google Search: how do you kill a werewolf

Notepad, next to the mouse and the overdue book resting beneath it:

  * silver bullets
  * regular bullets but you need to be a sniper
  * Beat it to death with a textbook or use its force against it
  * can a werewolf kill another werewolf? Find more about this
  * drown it
  * set it on fire



Google Search: cure for lycanthropy

  * proven: wolfsbane eases the transition but does not cure
  * ??? exhaustion, make them run until near death and then cleanse them
  * not worth trying: Sicilian knife/nail trick, because I am not ready to die
  * ??? Christian name calling/scolding the werewolf
  * also not proven: kinkshaming the werewolf
  * disproven: conversion to Christianity or a devotion to St. Hubert



Arthur’s back ached as he leaned in front of his computer and was not looking at the text from the living statue of a man who had said it was okay for his cat to eat three candles. He’d sent a couple of pictures of Iggy in various positions and refrained from taking a picture of her litter box and showing him the Christmas-colored result of her waxy and definitely illicit feast.

~~

He had so far gotten nowhere. Getting three unprompted texts of “what’s up” and updates in both purposely bad English and excellent Spanish from his ex-boyfriend was the last straw. Arthur needed a drink. He needed several drinks. Still no leads on the pack of werewolves; usually they made themselves more obvious. Plus he was now too self-conscious to go off of the mint trail after the chewing gum fiasco.

“Guinness,” he had begun his stay at the bar with. “Jameson,” he had said after two hours. “Another shot. God _dammit_ ,” he had finished his stay at the bar with.

“I’m cutting you off,” said the bartender, sounding so far away. _Maybe drinking and being a sorcerer aren’t a good mix_ , he thought for the umpteenth time, and would promptly forget the morning after. It wasn’t that anything was falling over or causing a scene; he was just afraid he might accidentally suppress his gag reflex and die.

He dragged himself off of the bar, paid whatever the faraway man was telling him, and walked out. Arthur barely looked old enough to be this wasted; he barely looked young enough to think smoking was cool, either, but here he was with a pilfered Marlboro between his fingers and pinging a light from his fingers, not noticing who saw him.

“Hey, Cornerwitch!”

He turned to the sound, eyes out of focus.

“Why…”

“You’re wearing the same jacket as when I first saw you. Didn’t realize it had a _hood,_ ” he said quietly, pulling it down before Arthur pulled it back up.

“What are you doing here?” Arthur asked, trying to act more sober than he actually was as he stuck his smoke between his teeth.

“It’s a small town, in case you haven’t noticed. We are literally in the middle of the damn hills. Probably different from your London—“

“ _Cardiff,_ you absolute… _git._ ”

Gilbert squinted, lips parting in something Arthur recognized as amusement and something that was almost admiration.

“You’re drunk.”

“You…” said Arthur, trying desperately to focus his gaze and go back to being someone more menacing, “…are a _cunt._ ”

“You. Need to go home.” Those dark brows crushed together over Arthur’s bright green eyes. Gilbert kept his face bathwater smooth but wanted to burst out laughing.

“You. Should sod _off.”_

“Make me.”

Arthur was still too drunk, too beer-softened, for any of his mismatched features to be anything but mildly dizzying for the taller man.

“I’m…Arthur, can you call an Uber?”

“I’m finishing my cigarette. You call it.”

Gilbert’s throat hummed at the thought, already vibrating inside like a tuning fork from the smell’s contrast with the cold air. “I have a flip phone, so I can’t call jack shit. So I repeat, can you call an Uber?”

“…no.”

“Do you want me to stay with you?”

“Why are you so…everywhere?”

Those straight-cut eyebrows arched about five degrees, perfect ruler-drawn lines on the rest of his blade of a face.

“Like I said…small town. Do you…are you calling the Uber?”

~~

Arthur woke up fully clothed on a tweed couch that he did not own with a headache that he wished he didn’t have. The sun was up and out and it existed to torment him. Squeezing his eyes shut before opening them again, he turned over to look into a pair of eyes that _definitely_ didn’t belong to his cat.

In fact, three pairs of eyes.

“Hello.” _You’re talking to a dog. You’re talking to three dogs._

The biggest one began to gently sniff him, a cold wet nose digging up his sleeve and then jumping up to sit on his leg.

“That’s Aster. He doesn’t mean any harm.” The Englishman lips pressed together, hands moving to press together in front of his nose.

The other two followed suit.

“I assume I am on your couch.”

“Yes, you _are.”_

“And there are three dogs on me.”

“Also true. Do you want them off?”

“No, I want you to stop talking.”

Gilbert took another gulp of his glass of water and moved out of the room. The dachshund got up from his perch on Arthur to follow his master out of the room. Arthur closed his eyes as Gilbert began to babytalk the dog in what he assumed was German.

“Do you want Advil?” called the German as Arthur sat up.

“I want…” His head began to spin. “a _toilet_ —“ he gasped, running to the open bathroom door and sticking his head in the toilet bowl just in time for his stomach to reject all that he’d drank the night before.

Gilbert tsk-tsked behind him with a second glass of water for himself and a first for Arthur.

“I’m surprised that you’d be so shit at drinking, Cornerwitch. I thought holding your liquor was one of the prides of the—“

“Will you _shut up—“_ Arthur snapped before heaving again.

Gilbert sat on the couch and scratched his dachshund’s belly while waiting for his new… _whatever_ to finish vomiting.

“ _Er ist resoluten, meinst du?”_ he muttered before kissing the dog’s floppy ear. The retching seemed to have stopped. Arthur slumped out of the bathroom, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and gingerly taking the glass of water Gilbert had left for him.

Gilbert’s flat was little more than a postage stamp; it was a miracle that his dogs hadn’t torn the place up yet. Arthur could walk pretty well into the small kitchen without having to move too far from the bathroom. The window that had been showing the sunlight in to assault Arthur was in the kitchen, with a planter hanging just under it and tingeing the light a bit violet. What were those flowers? He wasn’t tall enough to get a good look.

“Monkshood,” said Gilbert, now standing behind him.

“ _Wolfsbane?_ ” he asked, turning to look at him incredulously. Sharp, mint-smelling Gilbert.

“I have it for medicinal purposes.”

“It’s _poisonous._ ”

“I have chronic Lyme and as a result I have neuralgia. If you make an ointment from the flowers and apply it to the area, it takes the pain away. I take it in supplement with some prescription pain pills. Aconitum. It’s been used since the Romans. Google it. ” An airtight, well documented defense. Arthur was still at least tucking that factoid about him away for later.

“Have your dogs ever gotten into it?”

“Yes. I used to have eight.”

Arthur’s eyes narrowed, scrutinizing Gil’s straight face.

“I’m joking. They’re that high up for a reason.”

Arthur closed his eyes before inhaling, the air sharp on his raw throat.

“Thank you for having me, but I’m going to see myself home now, because I have only known you for three weeks and I’m not about to stay in your flat for the rest of the day.”

“If I’m not _too_ much of a hassle, stay awhile instead of destroying my bathroom, drinking my water, and then fucking off. At least stay a while.” Profanity sounded almost clean in Gilbert’s accented English, airy and elegant in its strange intonation. Arthur could at least admit to himself that he liked it. He could also admit that the German was right in strong-arming him into developing a relationship with at least _someone_ in the town other than the bossman at the chip shop two blocks away from his flat.

“Fine, then.”

They spent a few hours together; Arthur curled into the couch with a shit cup of tea but not telling him that it was a shit cup of tea and instead using it as a glorified porcelain hand warmer.

It was mostly a question/answer session. Where are you from? Berlin. You’re from Cardiff, yes? Yes. Why are you here? I kind of just ended up here. I had family here but they moved back to Germany and I was studying, so they didn’t want to make me start over. These dogs are theirs originally. If we went back, they’d’ve had to be quarantined. It’s for the best. Arthur asks if he misses them. Silence.

“Gilbert?” Gilbert looked up, those too-close eyes sharp over his aquiline nose, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Why are _you_ here?” he redirects, not meeting Arthur’s gaze.

Arthur hesitated.

“Here for business,” he answered. Gilbert’s mouth twisted and so did Arthur’s stomach.

“Really? Just business?”

“I got an assignment and I needed a change of pace.” Arthur can feel Gilbert’s eyes sizing him up and his stomach is still twisting just below his ribcage. Gilbert takes another sip of his glass of water.

“What kind of assignment?”

“Classified.”

“Oh, _classified._ You’re recruiting for an Occult school or something? That’s what it is, isn’t it?”

Arthur’s eyebrows raised. He’d never said anything about being a sorcerer.

“Come on now, you have Occult written all over you. You walk into my office saying that your cat—you have a _cat_ , you giant stereotype—ate a candle, _three_ unscented candles, and you think I can’t figure that you have some kind of altar going?”

Arthur sniffs.

“Could ask _you_ about being Occult, given the…. _monkshood_ you have growing up there. You ought to grow weed like a normal twentysummat.”

Gilbert tips his head back and lets out that wheezing, bizarre laugh. Arthur found himself thinking Gilbert was beautiful. Arthur very quickly suppressed that thought.


	3. Chapter 3

Tomorrow was the full moon. The Mead Moon, to be precise. You may be shocked to find that each full moon has a name. This is no news to Arthur, who often recites their names off when he’s trying to convince himself that he’s sober.

Arthur had now been in town for a month and had exactly one friend that wasn’t his cat. He was now getting texts from his boss about where the werewolf was and Arthur had to politely inform him that he had narrowed it down to three people and was waiting for the full moon to be absolutely sure. One of those people was Gilbert. There were too many signs to indicate it; it had to be either him, the one man he kept seeing scuttling in and out of the apothecary, or the young woman he was seeing around with her hair in a braid and cheating people out of their money with card tricks. Then again, he’d only been able to collect enough information about Gilbert because the German was so… _open_. Nothing he’d observed seemed to indicate a “pack” like reported, though; pack behavior would have been much easier to spot. It was probably…no, it was _definitely_ why this had been taking him so long. Lone wolves had no problem blending into a crowd.

He had set up an altar specific to the moon in the hopes of fortifying his magic and giving him _some_ kind of lead. The sun was setting. _Sorry, townspeople, for my sad excuse of detective skills. You will have to deal with me waiting for the night to fall and pray to whatever gods you have to not get eaten up by the hairs of your chinny chin chins._

The sun had set and the moon was shining through his window. He had lit so many candles, all basking the small flat in their soft glow. He drew sigils and cast a pentagram around him. The mugwort, nutmeg and cinnamon were smoldering in front of him as he recited something he’d learned in his first few weeks of studies. He twisted a yarrow branch in his fingers, worrying the wood with his fingernails as he asked the Universe for some kind of sign.

He went about this six times, burnt an offering of tea leaves and incense, and went to bed. _Any sign._

It was dawn when his cell phone pinged. Who could be texting him at this hour—

 **Gilbert Bielschmidt:** hey so I had a wild night and I kind of woke up naked with my dogs in the forest? Can you come stat? Maybe with a water bottle and some pants?

~~

No one fucks with a woman on a motorcycle, especially not _this_ woman on a motorcycle. She was the definition of an ice princess: skin the same color as the inside of an almond, snow-globe white-blonde hair and violet eyes. Stunning, both in the good way and the bad way.

She was on the move. She walked silver and obsidian in a straight line, her boots hitting the ground faster and faster as she got closer to her target. Google Maps kept saying “turn left, turn left,” thinking she had already gotten onto her bike.

Her knuckles clenched around the handle of a pearl-handled revolver. An old and dying weapon for an old and dying profession.

A snarl from the parking lot; there is a howl and something barreling towards her. Muscle memory and the pistol was out, silver slug flying through the air to hit its target straight between the eyes. She stepped over the now-human corpse to straddle her motorcycle, fixing the photo firmly wedged and taped into the dashboard. A young man, baby-faced and smiling sweetly at the camera. She reached for the one tattoo she had: a name, definite in its black ink, imposed over four long, gaping scars on her shoulder. Iван.

She kisses two of her fingers and presses them to the photograph before starting the engine.

~~

There is only just enough room for Gilbert and the three dogs in Arthur’s car. Gilbert is wearing a pair of boxers that Arthur threw at him and has a blanket wrapped around him. While his clothes are missing, he has a small bag with his phone, a lighter, three batteries, and a pack of gum. Gilbert comments on how his car smells weird. Arthur just presses his lips together and pretends that he isn’t looking at Gilbert’s bare chest or how smooth the movement is when Gilbert bends over and grabs a pair of joggers from the backseat. Gilbert lightly tosses his bag to the Englishman save for his phone.

“These have little ducks on them.”

“They were a present,” replies Arthur coolly, “which is why they’re covering you right now; I never wore them. Care to explain why you were out in the woods and naked on a Tuesday?”

The dachshund is wiggling across the island into Gilbert’s lap. Arthur shifts into reverse, nonchalantly putting his arm over Gilbert’s seat to look behind him. Arthur has Gilbert’s tiny bag in his lap and Gilbert’s dachshund is still wriggling with glee against Gilbert’s chest.

“I have the day off today, so I had a few too many beers and fucked off into the woods with my dogs, I guess.”

“It had nothing to do with the full moon?”

Gilbert gets very quiet.

“Gilbert, you call me naked from the forest. You have three dogs. You drink like a fish and you’re strong enough to get me to your place when I’m inebriated. You have a natural affinity for animals, enough for Iggy to warm up to you. You grow wolfsbane in your house. You smell like mint—“

“That’s the gum—“

“No it’s not, because if the gum in this bag is the stuff you’ve been chewing, then you might want to realize that it’s the _scentless_ kind of nicotine gum.”

Gil laughs, and it’s a belly laugh instead of that wheezy chuckle Arthur is used to hearing.

“You got me. Got changed a couple years ago by this giant Russian guy. My family left back to Germany as a result. I told them to. I’m a loner, though, so you don’t have to worry about a whole other posse of wolves coming for you.” Arthur realizes that the “pack” might have just been Gilbert running in the woods with his dogs.

“Get the mint kind next time.”

“I never liked the taste of mint.”

“So are you going to bite my throat out now that I know?” Arthur asks, eyes on the road as he merged on the highway.

“Nah. Not that kind of werewolf. I’m surprised it took you that long, Cornerwitch.”

“Knew fine, just didn’t want to be one of those people who suspects the first cute guy they see to be a supernatural creature. Rather tacky, you know.”

“You think I’m cute?”

Arthur’s mouth is screwed shut and his eyes are still on the road.

“Arthur, do you think I’m cute?”

“What is this, grammar school?”

“If it’s such an easy question for you to answer, why don’t you answer it?”

“I’m driving.”

“Pull over.”

“No, I’m on the highway. We’re getting back to my flat. We will talk then, alright?”

He sees Gilbert put a hand to his own collar in an act of mock surprise.

“So _sudden_.” Arthur’s face is reddening and Gilbert doesn’t know if it’s out of embarrassment or out of exasperation.

“Sod _off_.”

~~

The scarred woman on a motorcycle is on the way to an extremely small town in the hills. Her name is Natalya, and she’s on a damn mission.

Her hair is long and half of it is tucked into the back of her collar, the other half held up in her motorcycle helmet.

There is a tip she got about another werewolf in the village in the hills. One that might know something about the boy on her dashboard. She causes her bike to accelerate. Her pistol is burning in its holster. Six silver bullets are nestled in the barrel, each with some poor bastard’s name on them. She wants answers. _Who did that to you, Vanya?_

~~

They are at Arthur’s apartment and his heart is in his throat. Gilbert is standing next to him and mint and self-assuredness radiated off of his skin. Iggy is yowling inside and Arthur is smoothly unlocking the door. It’s an action that, like almost everything else that he’s done, has been consistently rehearsed to make it seem like he has everything together.

“So are you going to call me cute again?”

“This is really not a conversation we should be having, Gilbert. It was a turn of phrase.”

Gilbert has dropped the blanket to walk around in Arthur’s joggers and is casually nosing through Arthur’s belongings. Arthur is still watching him move, leaning back against the fridge as the kettle boils.

“So you don’t think I’m cute?”

Iggy is in Gilbert’s arms. She doesn’t even seem to smell the dogs on him; all three are waiting patiently outside the door.

“Do you want tea?”

“Do you want to call me cute?”

Arthur is purposely avoiding eye contact. Gilbert is biting back a smile and is walking towards him, lightly tapping him on the back and leaning over him. The look on his face is a playfulness fading into mild concern.

“Hey, I didn’t mean it, I’ll stop teasing you—“

Arthur is kissing him, cold hands pulling him down by the neck and shoulders. He tastes like cigarette smoke and cloves. It almost makes Gil want to start smoking again. He finds himself leaning forward to press him against the fridge, the fingers on his left hand curling around the countertop. He finds his other hand move to grab at Arthur’s belt loop and pull him close, so starved for touch that when Arthur’s fingers grip into him it shoots through his nerves like a roman candle.

Arthur finally pulls away to glance over at the door.

“Do your dogs want to come in?”

Gilbert’s eyes are backlit with both mischief and admiration.

“What, you want them to watch?”

Gilbert’s laughing at his own joke and he gets a bite to the neck.

“Cheeky.”

Gil lets the other push him back, lets him maneuver because he knows if he does anything, lays a hand on him during this period it will bruise his partner like a cider apple. He falls back on the Englishman’s bed and looks at him with the smallest, most self-satisfied smile on the planet. Arthur wants to wipe it off of him.

“What are you going to do, Cornerwitch?”

Arthur flicks his fingers and Gil’s hands are pinned over his head. Arthur tugs down his joggers.

“I’m taking my clothes back.”


	4. Chapter 4

Natalya has arrived in town. She’s slowing down and rolling by each and every door. She’s sniffing the air like a sheriff’s bloodhound. No one questions this because they take one look at her and immediately decide that they want nothing to do with whatever she is doing. They are all making a wise decision in minding their business. The smell of mint hits her nostrils and she feels the scar on her shoulder burn hot and her pistol burn even hotter. She’s close, and only getting closer. She stops her bike for a moment and grabs her water bottle before looking down at her phone. Yes, this was definitely the town. This was definitely her man. This was definitely going to get her somewhere.

“Excuse me, miss?”

She looks to the young man in front of her, pushing her aviators up to rest on the crown of her head like an Alice band. She’s surprised, but her face doesn’t seem to express this to any degree.

“Yes?”

He is courageous in his cowardice, voice shaking when he pushes back a lock of brown hair behind his ear. He is unfortunately not the source of the spearmint sharp in her sinuses. He’s very cute, she realizes. Too bad she’s working; otherwise she might actually give a damn.

“Are you looking for something?”

For the first time in a very long time, she smiles. It is terrifying, but he does not seem to think so.

“I’m looking for a man with silver hair, tall, about my age. Funny colored eyes. He’s also a werewolf. Any clue where I can find someone that meets any of those criteria?”

~~

Gil wakes up before Arthur does because he hears Aster whining at the door. He trudges, naked, to open it and let them in, hoping that Iggy won’t mind or that her not giving a fuck will overpower her feline proclivities. Iggy is perched on Arthur’s side of the bed, glaring but not hissing. All three dogs stand patiently in a row.

He looks back at Arthur, still fast asleep and not budging in the slightest, wearing that smug, blissful facial expression reserved only for royalty and the well-fucked. Gil’s face lights with a self-satisfied smile before his gaze drifts to the desktop monitor and he realizes what time it is.

What many don’t know about werewolves is that much like a menstrual cycle, shifting happens on more than one day of the month. It is three days out of every twenty-eight where one shifts. It is now day two. And Gilbert has shagged away any of his remaining energy.

He grabs the pair of pants he discarded earlier and pulls them on before he notices the notebook open next to the computer. Curiosity getting the better of him, he picks it up and begins to read it:

  * _silver bullets_
  * _regular bullets but you need to be a sniper_
  * _Beat it to death with a textbook or use its force against it_
  * _can a werewolf kill another werewolf? Find more about this_
  * _drown it_
  * _set it on fire_



Gilbert’s mouth suddenly feels very dry. He looks around: does Arthur own a gun? Is there any—

His instincts kick in and he pulls up the borrowed pair of joggers faster than he can even register. Arthur stirs and Gilbert leaves the notebook perpendicular to the other book on his table, incapable of making a mess even while in a hurry.

_You’re an idiot. Again? Last time…_

He didn’t want to think about last time.

He and the dogs are out the door before Arthur rolls over, muttering in his sleep about being cold.

~~

Arthur wakes up on his own. He takes maybe five seconds to remember what happened, seven to realize that Gilbert has left, and ten seconds becomes the total when the regret kicks in. He gets up to see if there was something to indicate as to why Gilbert had decided to skate off with Arthur’s duck pants and joggers. Arthur’s eyes alight on the notepad on his desk. _Silver bullets. Regular bullets but you need to be a sniper…_

His heart sinks down past his gut and into his pelvis.

There’s a knock on the door before Arthur can begin to panic.

“One moment,” he calls.

He gets on a good half of his clothes before there’s another knock and he pulls his shirt on at the third.

“I’m coming, I’m coming—“

He opens the door to the barrel of a revolver.

“Do you have a warrant for that, miss?”

“Do you give a damn?”

She moves forward and his hands are only barely up, looking around to see if anyone else is seeing what he’s seeing.

“I followed a werewolf trail here. It doesn’t match your description.”

“You just missed him.” His chuckle is far from nervous. Natalya does not chuckle back. “So…has he done anything to warrant a hunt?”

“Is that any of your business?” Her nose wrinkles. “You stink of werewolf.”

_Did just have sex with one—_

Her eyes are glittering and so is the pearl handle on her gun.

“That I do. But you haven’t answered my question. Why do you have a magical weapon? Do you need it?”

“Since the accident.”

“What accident?”

Her lips tilt upward.

“Found out my brother was a werewolf. He changed in front of me. Clawed me. I grabbed him by the throat and squeezed the life out of him. Felt his soul slip out between my fingers.” She shrugs her jacket off a bit to show the scars. “Ivan was a good man. I want to find who made him…made him like that.”

Arthur is trying to see what crystals he has within three feet of where he’s currently standing. He needs to start wearing them more often.

“I didn’t want to assume due to the pistol. I’ve heard much of you, Miss Arlovskaya. I’m sorry for your loss, but I think you have the wrong man.”

Natalya shrugs.

“One less werewolf means one more spirit in Hell where it belongs.” She lowers her gun. “Thanks. Bye.”

Arthur murmurs something as she goes and his fingers glow a light green.

~~

Gilbert realizes too late that he forgot to take his wolfsbane…fuck, no, his _monkshood,_ damn it, it’s called _monkshood_. He feels his hands start to morph first. He begins to run further into the forest, quietly muttering a reminder to himself as his legs begin to bow into hindquarters.

“Pater noster, qui es in caelis…”

His bones begin to crack and he gasps.

“Sanctificetur nomen tuum. Adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua—“

His mouth feels much more full of teeth.

“…sicut in caelo et in terra. Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie…”

His fingers begin to clench and claw.

“et dimitte nobis debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris.”

He finds himself apologizing to the man who was plotting to murder him as his legs begin to rip through the pilfered joggers. He doesn’t have much longer.

“Et _ne nos inducas in tentationem, sed LIBERA NOS A MALO—“_

He is screaming, roaring, gnashing his teeth before finally dropping to all fours. He’s sporting the red eyes, dripping white fangs, black lips, cold black nose and all. Monstrous.

_Lupus Dei. Amen._


	5. Chapter 5

Natalya is not the only one who can locate a werewolf. Natalya, however, is not one to be able to tell a decoy werewolf trail from a real one.

Arthur’s running very quickly through the woods, fingers wrapped around a crystal and a conducting branch. He knows Natalya is not here yet, based on the spell he cast as she left and the fact that she’s following the false trail Arthur left. Arthur can feel his breath quaking in his lungs, fighting the stillness of the July air.

Never mind that he just ran into a forest with a very live and contagious werewolf in it. Never mind that it was convinced he was there to murder it. Fine.

“Gilbert…” he murmurs, the crystal pulsing between his fingers. He has a stunning spell on the tip of his tongue and a silver amulet tied to his belt.

He’s suddenly stopped by a dachshund, who is sniffing and sneezing at him in what Arthur can only guess to be a gesture of goodwill.

Arthur then hears the howl.

His mother used to talk about _beansí,_ whose cries meant death of a family member. Arthur figured the _beansí_ differed from a werewolf in that the _beansí_ meant someone else was going to die, whereas if you heard a werewolf that close then _you_ were the dead man.

Twigs were snapping maybe ten meters away. Arthur accepted that he was a dead man.

People often think that werewolves are large and bipedal wolfmen. No. That does not encapsulate how horrifying they are.

A werewolf is a wolf the size of a tiger with the eyes of a man: they glitter more than the teeth, but both cut into you cleaner than a gamma knife. Gilbert was a white wolf with those frightening eyes and a snarl that made Arthur think that the wolf was just as much a man as beast.

“Gilbert Bielschmidt,” he says as firmly as if he were saying an incantation.

The wolf snaps and begins to come forward. Arthur senses Natalya’s presence. She is coming in fast. There’s not much time.

“Gilbert _Bielschmidt._ ”

The wolf keens before it howls. Arthur’s focus is broken by the unmistakable _crack_ of a gun going off; a tree branch falls behind the wolf and it charges. Arthur can see Natalya just off in the distance. She is sprinting.

_“GILBERT BIELSCHMIDT!”_

The wolf begins to change to man mid lunge, falling to the ground as Arthur lurches to reach Natalya. He reaches forward and freezes her there.

“Maybe next time you decide to break and enter, don’t do it to a sorcerer!” She is frozen mid-stride, the air stalling in her lungs. He pulls the gun out of her hands and empties it of its bullets.

“He’s not your man. I guarantee it. The spell will wear off in ninety minutes. If you’re alive at the end of it, I expect to see you at the warrant office.” He pockets the bullets before giving her a long look, turning back to look at the naked man twitching on the ground about fifty meters away.

Gilbert is sweating and groaning and covered in pine needles.

“Take your medicine,” says the Englishman as he helps him up.

“Maybe I will next time. You know what, though?”

“What?”

“That three times thing with the names. That’s never been tried before and documented, so you can officially prove that it works.”

“That’s what I live for.”

“But…the myth is that it can only work if the person saying the werewolf’s Christian name is in love with the werewolf.”

Arthur is quiet and looking at the full moon. He sees Gilbert grinning in the corner of his eye and pretends to not acknowledge it.

“Sometimes myths are just myths.”

Gilbert cackles and Arthur lightly kisses his hand.

~~

There are two strange men in town.

They live in a house on the outskirts of town with two cats, three dogs, and twelve chickens. One works from home and the other is a veterinarian. When you come into their house you can sometimes see that a woolen jumper is knitting itself or a tea kettle is pouring on its own into a waiting teapot. Once a month for about three days they go out of town and tell everyone that it’s to their cottage in the woods, that they go camping. They grow multitudes of plants outside, and when someone calls it the shorter one’s herb garden the taller one interjects very quickly to dispel the tense look on his partner’s face. You must not touch any of those plants, especially that one purple flower that you must never, _ever_ eat, for goodness sakes.

And they are very happy.


End file.
